The Thirteen

by Wheller

Chapter 4

Four

Their crossing was mostly uneventful. Though, it did take a bit longer than expected. On the fourth day of their crossing, one of the Jaime’s crewmembers spotted torpedoes in the water, and fortunately, the destroyer had been able to take evasive manoeuvres to avoid them. The ship’s captain decided at that point it would be best to proceed forward with zig zag manoeuvres. This was supposed to make it harder for them to be attacked with torpedoes. Redheart wasn’t sure exactly how effective it was, either way, it was the only time they had come under attack on the trip over.

Well, there was one other time, a mistaken case of near friendly fire. Five hundred kilometres from the shore of the port of Viga, their destination, the Jaime came under fire from a Praesidium Heavy Cruiser, the Leninov, who had mistaken them for a Schäferhund destroyer. They’d only gotten one shot off before they realised their mistake, and fortunately, they’d missed.

Not by much though, Redheart had been on deck at the time, and the concussive blast from the shell exploding as it hit the water behind them had been enough to knock her off her hooves.

They were only to be in Viga a short time. It was here, along with two other brigades, that they went through a hurried training. It was a two-week muster course, that taught them how to shoot, and to quickly whip them into fighting shape.

Redheart had wondered about that, she wondered how exactly a pony could use a gun on first seeing one. She looked down at a rifle Dieter had put out for display.

It was a simple design, shaped like a long pole, with a large metal handle near the back, that was pulled back to cycle the weapon. Dieter gave them a demonstration on how the action worked, the bolt, as he called it, was pulled back, and the round ejected, and a new one from the internal magazine was pulled into place, ready to fire.

All well in good, though Redheart didn’t quite see how this could be of practical use. Not at first, at least.

Dieter, spotted her sceptical look at once. ‘Something on your mind? Nurse Redheart?’ he asked, a smirk appearing on his face.

‘Yes, how do we use it?’ she asked simply.

‘I am glad you asked. Seeing as you’ve asked, I shall use you to demonstrate,’ Dieter said with a grin.

The solution had been ingenious. Dieter had called it a Storm Harness, a sort of light weight metal frame, that when properly fastened, held a soldier’s entire compliment of weapons, and ammunition. Dieter helped Redheart into one, fastened in one of the rifles, and ten or so clips of ammunition. She had been so fascinated that she'd forgotten she'd signed up, not to fight, but to tend to the sick and injured.

Dieter dropped the pretence later that same day, and informed her that knowing how to use a weapon could be all the difference in maintaining her life. There would be circumstances where it would be her life, or the life of an enemy. This had made her uncomfortable, but she soon figured out it was simply a practical matter in the end. You killed those trying to kill you and your friends. They’d given up their right to life the moment they’d tried to take yours. (This wasn’t exactly the best outlook on life for a nurse to have. Redheart was still struggling to unlearn this one.)

The Storm Harness was quite impressive though. The frame had her rifle attached to her left flank, and she could adjust the exact direction it was pointing with a little control knob she turned with her teeth. Resting just below her chin was the firing control yoke. You could bring the gun to rest, and the gun to bear, by moving the yoke up or down. Generally, it was kept in the down position so as to not get in the way. To fire, you bit down on the yoke. To aim, there was a little cross hair that dropped down over her eye, allowing her to see where the rifle was pointing to, and allowing her to deliver shots accurately. To reload, you merely kicked your leg out to the side, and the reloading mechanism would slot a new clip into the rifle’s internal magazine. Inside the rifle, there was a little peg that stuck out when the magazine was full that blocked the reloading mechanism from sliding in a new clip accidentally. Redheart was impressed with the precision engineering that had come with the design and manufacture of the device.

Dieter smiled proudly. ‘It is of Schäferhund design,’ he said.

Dieter might be an exile, and an enemy of the current government, but it could not be said that he was not proud to be a Schäferhund.

The unicorns, of course, did not need to use them, and as a result did not. The unicorns of their Brigade, instead trained with specially modified rifles. Ones with buttstocks, external triggers, (Vinyl said it was easier to focus telekinesis on a piece on the outside of something, rather than on the internal trigger of a normal rifle, though not impossible,) and gunsights actually placed on the rifle itself.

The Espanya Sauser rifle utilised by Vinyl, and the standard model, as used by Redheart were considered to be the same weapon, though the only parts they had in common were the barrel, and the ammunition they used. The modified version could be used in a Storm Harness as well, though it was preferred not to, as it involved connecting several more moving parts compared to the standard model.

By the end of the day, Redheart had become a decently good shot, at least at unmoving targets that didn’t shoot back at her. She wasn’t sure how well she could handle moving targets that shot back yet.

Too next to no one’s surprise. Vinyl Scratch ended up being the best shot. She had just the right kind of crazy for everyone there to believe it.

She’d managed to bullseye a target at three hundred metres, on the first shot. This impressed Dieter.

‘Do you have any experience with fire arms? Miss Scratch?’ he asked as Vinyl blew steam off the barrel of her rifle.

‘Nope, my first time using one,’ she admitted. ‘It does feel natural though, using a gun—maybe in a past life I used one regularly,’ she said with a grin.

Dieter rolled his eyes at this, and sent them back to their practise.

———

Redheart sat quietly at her desk in Doctor Nightly’s clinic, staring down at her typewriter. Which, being made for earth ponies like her, took up an entire length of her L shaped desk. Doctor Nightly had gone out to lunch, and left her to man the clinic in case of any emergencies. They had no appointments on the books for today, so that left her for want of something to do.

Doctor Nightly had been waiting impatiently for her to return from the copyist, he instructed her to file the forms, and then headed off to lunch.

He didn’t mean to be a jerk. He was usually quite pleasant, but he was still annoyed with Redheart about what had happened this morning. She sighed, but disregarded it. Things would be fine between them tomorrow. Today was Friday, which, of course, meant that tomorrow was Saturday. Redheart was not looking forward to it. Saturdays and Sundays were her days off. Meaning too much time to be had with her own thoughts. The clinic’s day staff had a well-established schedule. Redheart off Saturday and Sunday. Doctor Nightly took Mondays and Tuesdays, and the other day shift nurse, Tenderheart, had off Thursday and Friday. Wednesday, usually their busiest day, had all three of them working.

Redheart didn’t mind the schedule, it worked for her, and Tenderheart didn’t mind working on the weekends, so it was fair enough.

Redheart closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She liked how quiet it was in the clinic, or at least she did until someone threw open the door.

‘Nurse Redheart!’ a young mare’s voice called out, causing Redheart to jump and let out a gasp of surprise. She hated being startled.

‘What!?’ she asked coarsely, looking annoyed at the young mare who just barged in.

It was Rose, one of Ponyville’s three florists. Why Ponyville needed three was something she had no idea about. Rose was taken aback by Redheart’s reaction to her, and stuttered her response. ‘They’re back,’ she said.

‘Who?’ Redheart asked, figuring she already knew the answer.

‘Twilight Sparkle, and her friends,’ Rose said simply.

Redheart gave her a grumpy look. ‘And? Are any of them injured?’

Rose blinked at her. ‘Um, no, it doesn’t look like it.’

Redheart rolled her eyes. ‘So why are you telling me?’

‘Um—’ Rose began, but Redheart rose a hoof and waved her off.

‘Go home Rose,’ she said simply and looked back down at her desk.

Rose departed without another word, the interaction left Redheart in a foul mood. She had nothing against Rose, she was just more upset about being startled than anything else, that and the bad news she bore. The relative tranquillity that Ponyville had had while Twilight Sparkle and her friends were on their northern trip at the edge of Equestria was sure to be over and done with now.

Doctor Nightly came back to the office a short time later, giving Redheart the opportunity to go have lunch. She was starving, she’d gotten distracted twice this morning and it had messed up her rhythm.

Redheart sighed as she stopped by, popping into a café, and walked head long into another pony. She stumbled in surprise, not expecting anypony to be there, since it was past everyone’s normal lunch hour.

‘Sorry I—’ Redheart said, and paused. She looked up to find the pony she had run into staring back at her. She blinked as she looked at the mare.

‘Vinyl Scratch?’ Redheart asked.

Vinyl smiled warmly at her. Not her obnoxious grin, but a genuine smile. ‘Redheart!’

Redheart scowled at her and lashed out, smacking her across the face.

Vinyl flinched as the blow landed, she frowned and gently rubbed her cheek, before finally admitting. ‘I deserved that.’

Comments

[DreadedCandiru2]

Yeah, she kinda does at that....